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HAT TIPS

Posted 6/10/09 (Wed)

By Dean Meyer

Hello,

Wow! I’m not sure if it is an early snow or a late snow! The sixth of June and six inches of snow on the deck? But it switched to a welcome rain. I tell you what, it was like one of those rains from when I was a kid. It just kept on for a couple days, and the country around here looks as good as it could. Hope yours does too.
That rain got me to thinking about my grandpa. He once told me “it always rains right after a dry spell!” And you know, he was right! I’ve been watching that. Never could figure out how he knew that.
And then came the big chase and the shootout over at Gladstone. It almost sounded like a “Bonnie and Clyde” thing. We had all the law enforcement in the area involved and after chasing these outlaws across seven states. After eluding officers for days, they met their match in southwest North Dakota. They even pulled seventeen patrolman and sixteen county sheriffs off of Highway 22, where they’ve been watching for those violent speeders and seat belt offenders. None of the good guys were hurt and the “Barrow” gang is in lockup.
But, that too reminded me of Grandpa Herb. One spring, I suppose I was in my early teens, I was staying with Grandpa and Grandma helping calf out a bunch of heifers. We were on a little homestead fifteen miles or so southwest of Berthold. Up in Ward County.
We would always watch Gunsmoke (I’m still in love with Miss Kitty), the ten o’clock news, have a bowl of ice cream, check heifers, and go to bed. Then you’d get up a couple of times during the night to check heifers.
One night as we were watching the news, there was breaking news about some jail escapees. They were possibly in the Berthold area. The newscast also made it clear that these escapees were considered armed and dangerous. Everyone was to take the keys out of any vehicles. We had a car and a pickup in the yard, and I quickly ran out and took the keys out of the vehicles.
We finished the news and our ice cream, and I was slipping on my boots to go check heifers. Grandpa handed me the keys to the car and pickup, and told me to put them back in the outfits.
Boy, I quickly objected and warned him that they might be stolen if we left the keys in them.
Grandpa just looked at me and kind of smiled. “Well,” he says, “If those boys come here and need a vehicle, I’d rather they didn’t have to come in the house to find the keys!”
I think grandpas were smarter when I was a kid.